America's Team Trivialities

For years (and years and years) most Cowboys fans have heard some variation of this clever insult: “The Cowboys aren’t really America’s Team.”

The most recent iteration of this comes on the heels of a vitally important poll showing that defending Super Bowl champion Green Bay is the most popular team in America. That led the author to state definitely that “actual data exists and reveals the Cowboys aren’t ‘America’s Team,’ having been replaced by the Green Bay Packers, according toPublic Policy Polling’s newest national survey.”

The last time I had a serious online argument with someone about whether the Packers or the Cowboys were truly “America’s Team” was the last time that the Packers were the defending champions. That was 1997.

Using the logic espoused by most of these commentators, whichever team holds the Vince Lombardi Memorial Trophy should strip the Cowboys of their nickname.

Please, come up with something more original.

A few thoughts:

1. You know why nobody is shouting that the Patriots, Saints, or Steelers are America’s Team right now? Because none of those teams hold the Lombardi Trophy right now.

2. Even when NFL Films first coined the term “America’s Team” for the Cowboys after the 1978 season, the Cowboys had as many haters as they did true fans.

3. The Cowboys have done nothing worth mentioning to retain their fan base in 15 years, yet the Cowboys rank high on these lists year after year. The team went 6-10 last year and currently stands at 8-6, yet the team ranked second in this survey. And should the Cowboys win another title someday, I would bet anything that the Cowboys rank #1 on both the Most Liked and Most Hated team lists.